choice. Everyone who wishes to accomplish anything that requires the coöperation of a large number of people follows their example. Sometimes it is done rather brutally as when the Peace Conference reduced itself to the Council of Ten, and the Council of Ten to the Big Three or Four; and wrote a treaty which the minor allies, their own constituents, and the enemy were permitted to take or leave. More consultation than that is generally possible and desirable. But the essential fact remains that a small number of heads present a choice to a large group.
6
The abuses of the steering committee have led to various proposals such as the initiative, referendum and direct primary. But these merely postponed or obscured the need for a machine by complicating the elections, or as H. G. Wells once said with scrupulous accuracy, the selections. For no amount of balloting can obviate the need of creating an issue, be it a measure or a candidate, on which the voters can say Yes, or No. There is, in fact, no such thing as "direct legislation." For what happens where it is supposed to exist? The citizen goes to the polls, receives a ballot on which a number of measures are printed, almost always in abbreviated form, and, if he says anything at all, he says Yes or No. The most brilliant amendment in the world may occur to him. He votes Yes or No on that bill and no other. You have to commit violence against the English language to call that legislation. I do not argue, of course, that there are no benefits, whatever you
